In Memory of my lost found cousin William Dumais dit Goodrich

August 2, 1937 - August 23, 2012

 Raquel (Rachel) Del Castillo Dumais

On January 10, 2010 I blogged about Raquel/Rachel Del Castillo who was my great aunt. I think she was also one of my mother's favorite aunts through marriage.  From the time I was quite young I remember my mother talking about "ma tante Rachel" (aunt Rachel). 

My mother spoke often of her and she thought she was one of the most stylish women she had ever known and she loved her for the wonderful person she was.  

The difficulty I encountered in doing our family genealogy and history was that I never knew how she fit into the family until I had a get-together with some of my mother's first cousins (my first cousins once removed).  Their mother was my grandmother's sister thus Dumais sisters so I figured they might be able to tell me something about the Dumais side of the family that I did not yet know.

While sharing and chatting, my cousin Rita asked if I had ever found information about Napoleon Dumais and his wife Raquel Del Castillo! Though only 5 years old when they returned to Lawrence from Cuba, now in her 90's, Rita remembered them and over the years wondered what had become of them. Wow!  I finally had a connection that I could dig into!

In my blog of January 10th I asked that if anyone knew anything about Rachel/Raquel Del Castillo to please contact me.  Lo and behold toward the end of June while I was painting our bathroom, I received a phone call from Florida.  Thinking it might be a telemarketer I almost did not pick up.  Then I decided I should so that this "person" would not keep calling.  I was floored when I heard the caller say "Hi, I believe we are related - Raquel Del Castillo was my great grandmother" - stunned, I asked her to repeat what she had just said... I was totally elated to have finally found this lost part of our family and our history.

This second cousin was none other than Adrianna Goodrich Blanco. She was excited.. I was excited.. and we had a difficult time putting our words together!  She told me that her uncle Bill Goodrich would call me later as he had been doing the family history.

  Cousin Bill Goodrich and his father Danilo Goodrich

Since that wonderful June 28th after Cousin Bill Goodrich called, we have exchanged photos and a good deal of information.  His son Jimmy has taken up the baton of family historian and I will share with him all of the information that I have on the Dumais family going back to the first progenitor, Jean Dumais who married Marguerite Richard in 1695 in France.

We have lots of ground to cover after all of these years!

Next:  Part 2: How Dumais becomes Goodrich - what happened to Napoleon Dumais, Raquel Del Castillo and their children.

 How Dumais became Goodrich

After many email exchanges and a couple of conversations with cousin Bill Goodrich, no one really knows how this name change occurred or why.  One can only assume it might have had to do with work or business relations in Cuba.

Cousin Bill told me that had his father not told him about the Dumais name he never would have known.  It seems that Napoleon Dumais had gone to Cuba and was working as a civil engineer of sorts, this information based on a ship's list that I also found.  I've no idea what kind of engineer he might have been as the Dumais children had no more education than when they arrived with in Massachusetts from Ste-Anastasie de Lyster, QC, Canada where they were all born.

 Raquel Del Castillo and Napoleon Dumais

 What became of Napoleon, Raquel 

and their Children?

Napoleon Dumais was born 21 August 1884 to Georges Dumais and Sara Demers in Ste-Anastasie.  He was the ninth of thirteen children and the fifth oldest of children who were still alive at the time of the family's migration to Lawrence, Massachusetts. According to a notebook I inherited from my grandmother Arthemise who was Napoleon's sister, the family arrived in Lawrence in 1891. That means that Napoleon was only seven years old at the time.  He was only thirteen years old when his mother died in 1897.  It had to be a difficult time for Napoleon and the family.

As a young adult he made his way to Cuba - it looks like we might never know the why of it all though I hope that someday we might find some clue.  I interviewed two of my elderly cousins whose mother was Napoleon's sister Beatrice.  Rita who is in her 90s was a little girl at the time but she remembers Napoleon and then his wife Raquel visiting their home often.

With the help of Cousin Bill Goodrich in Florida and the research I've been able to do, Napoleon and Raquel Del Castillo would have married abt. 1910 in Cuba.  While there, they had four children:  Noel Joseph, Gobley, George and Danilo who was Cousin Bill's father.  After their arrival in Lawrence two more children were born:  Gladys Marie Rachel and Norma Ida Clementine.

 Gobley, Noel, Danilo Dumais-Goodrich

According to the family history Cousin Bill was told, Napoleon was entrepreneurial.  It seems he would have been the first to bring dry cleaning operations to Cuba. The family seemed to think he was in the dry cleaning business in Lawrence but I've not been able to find any proof of that.  What I have found is that he worked as an insurance agent for Liberty Mutual. This was what he gave for his employment/employer in the WWI U.S. Draft Registration.

 George Dumais-Goodrich

Be that as it may, it seems that one day little George drank some cleaning fluid and died shortly thereafter. Napoleon was never the same after that. At some point he became very ill and died in 1923 at the age of thirty-nine.  His wife Raquel and the children returned to Cuba after saying their goodbyes to husband and father.

 Dr. Roman Del Castillo and Clementine Rodriguez

Back in Cuba, Raquel seems to have provided well for herself and her children.  Born abt 1889 to Dr. Roman Del Castillo and Clementine Rodriguez she apparently received an excellent education both in Cuba and in the United States.  She died in 1949 in Cuba.

Interestingly, though Raquel retained the name of Goodrich when she returned to Cuba, while living in Lawrence, Massachusetts the family had resumed the name of Dumais - Dumas is the spelling I found in the 1920 Federal 

Census.

Napoleon Dumais Genealogy

Napoleon Dumais 1884-1923 married circa 1910 Raquel Del Castillo abt. 1889-1949

Georges Dumais 1839-1903 married 1871 Sara Demers 1853-1897

Narcisse Dumais 1808-1834 married 1829 Marguerite Marquis1813-1873

Joseph Jean-Pierre Dumais 1764-1831 married 1790 Marie-Anne-Françoise Plourde1777-1816

Pierre Dumais 1714-1803 married 1755 Catherine Michaud abt. 1716-1755

Jean Dumais 1626----- married 1695 in France Marguerite Richard 1695

 

My sincere thanks to Cousin Bill Goodrich of Florida for providing all of the truly amazing Goodrich and Del Castillo photos I did not have.  He has a treasure trove of family photos and lots of good family history. 

N.B.  Later this week, I will post what I've learned about Cousin Bill and his family as well as the many messages we've exchanged since we first connected.

All rights reserved.

Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino

Just Call Me Lois! The 1940 Census

Just call me Lois!

When the enumerator came to our home, my French-Canadian grandmother must have been caring for me while my parents were at work as I was just a toddler.  My Mémère spoke little English, we were never allowed to speak English to her and never ever did she call me Lucie - I was baptized Lucienne so she and my mother always called me by that name.  The rest of the world called me Lucie, sometimes Lou (especially my sister) as Lucienne does not pronounce well in English.  As a child I didn't like my name when Scout leaders or other non-French would call me Loushiene.  UGH!

Anyhow, I can picture Mémère Levesque repeating the name to the enumerator so he'd get it right: "Lucie Enne" anyhow what the Irish, English-only speaking enumerator came away with and wrote down was LOIS E - so as I say, just call me Lois. 

To be honest, I am enjoying going through the 1940 Census and finding all of my family and extended family.  Seeing where they lived, who lived near them, what kind of work they were doing and how they fared where their education or work was concerned and how they did financially since they had all lived through the Great Depression.

At the same time, I must say that as much as the 1940 Census is both interesting it is also sad.  I am seeing relatives, neighbors, classmates who lived in my neighborhood who are no longer with us today.  You look at that and realize just how fleeting life is knowing that the many people you knew are gone.  Where have the years gone?  Where have our ethnic neighborhoods filled with families and extended families gone?


Now remember that if you decide to look for me in the 1940 Census, look for Lois E otherwise  you'll not find me.    Just think, all this time I've waited to see me in a census and now that the census has been released, I'm still not in it.  What can I say?  Perhaps this is a way to be forever young.

All rights reserved

Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino

April 1940 ~ forever young

Will You Be In The 1940 Census? - Part 1

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2012 I'm On It, But Not In It. No, it's not a riddle. It's the 1940 United States Census. I am not old enough to be IN the census listings (I'll be in the 1950 Census, though when it's released in April 2022). But I'm ON the case for Indexing the 1940 United States census. (Randy Seaver)

The statement above comes from Randy Seaver's blog Genea-Musings.  Ever since I read Randy's opening comment on February 27th, I've thought about it quite a bit because not only am I on it but I am *in* it.  I have volunteered to help index the 1940 census with Family Search - You can help to index this census too.

Needless to say, I am looking forward to seeing exactly what is on this census about my family.  It is also supposed to tell us where our grandparents were born more precisely than in past censuses.  For instance, that means that not only would the census tell us the country (example:  Canada) it would tell us the town, village or city (example:  Ste Anastasie)  I know all of that but want to see what the census says.

Everyone is abuzz about the 1940 census.  Census records are released every ten years.  April 2, 2012 will make ten years the enumeration for the 1940 census began.  It also means that the 72 year privacy wait ends on that date.  No one will receive a copy of this census before April 2nd.  Not ancestry.com, not familysearch, no one.  This is why it is critical that as many as possible sign up to index so it can be done perhaps within six months.  How many indexers there are will determine the length of time it will take.  Because it is not indexed is also why I suspect the NARA site will crash shortly after 9:00 a.m. when millions of people try to access the NARA site for a first glimpse at the census.  I hope I'm wrong!

I attended a lecture about this census presented by Walter Hickey who has worked for many years at the National Archives, Waltham, Massachusetts.  This morning I also listened to a webinar by Thomas MacEntee of Geneabloggers fame .  Both pretty much said the same thing but I enjoyed the refresher provided by the webinar.

When the census is released you can access it on the National Archives Government site.  This is a blank copy of the 1940 census form:

The following questions were asked (from the NARA site):

Questions Asked on the 1940 Census

Many of the questions on the 1940 census are the standard ones: name, age, gender, and race, education, and place of birth. But the 1940 census also asks many new questions. The instructions ask the enumerator to enter an [a circled x] after the name of the person furnishing the information about the family; whether the person worked for the CCC, WPA, or NYA the week of March 24-30, 1940; and income for the 12 months ending December 31, 1939. The 1940 also has a supplemental schedule for two names on each page. The supplemental schedule asks the place of birth of the person's father and mother; the person's usual occupation, not just what they were doing the week of March 24-30, 1940; and for all women who are or have been married, has this woman been married more than once and age at first marriage.

The complete list of the questions follows:

Location:

• Street, avenue, road, etc.
• House number (in cities and towns).

Household Data:

• Number of household in order of visitation.
• Home owned (O) or rented (R).
• Value of home, if owned, or monthly rental, if rented.
• Does this household live on a farm? (Yes or No).

Name:

• Name of each person whose usual place of residence on April 1, 1940, was in this household. Be sure to include:
  • Persons temporarily absent from household. Write "Ab" after names of such persons.
  • Children under 1 year of age. Write "Infant" if child has not been given a first name.
  • Enter X after name of person furnishing information.

Relation:

• Relationship of this person to the head of the household, as wife, daughter, father, mother-in-law, grandson, lodger, lodger's wife, servant, hired hand, etc...

Personal Description:

• Sex - Male (M), Female (F).
• Color or race.
• Age at last birthday.
• Marital status - Single (S), Married (M), Widowed (Wd), Divorced (D).

Education:

• Attended school or college any time since March 1, 1940? (Yes or No)
• Highest grade of school completed.

Place of Birth:

• If born in the United States, give State, Territory, or possession. If foreign born, give country in which birthplace was situated on January 1, 1937. Distinguish Canada-French from Canada-English and Irish Free State (Eire) from Northern Ireland.

Citizenship:

• Citizenship of the foreign born.

Residence, April 1, 1935:

IN WHAT PLACE DID THIS PERSON LIVE ON April 1, 1935? For a person who, on April 1, 1935, was living in the same house as at present, enter in Col. 17 "Same house," and for one living in a different house but in the same city or town, enter "Same place," leaving Cols. 18, 19, and 20 blank, in both instances. For a person who lived in a different place, enter city or town, county, and State, as directed in the Instructions. (Enter actual place of residence, which may differ from mail address.)

• City, town, or village having 2,500 or more inhabitants. Enter "R" for all other places.
• County.
• State (or Territory or foreign country).
• On a farm? (Yes or No).

Persons 14 Years Old and Over - Employment Status:

• Was this person AT WORK for pay or profit in private or nonemergency Gov't. work during week of March 24-30? (Yes or No).
• If not, was he at work on, or assigned to, public EMERGENCY WORK (WPA, NYA, CCC, etc.) during week of March 24-30? (Yes or No).

If neither at work nor assigned to public emergency work. ("No" in Cols. 21 and 22).

• Was this person SEEKING WORK? (Yes or No).
• If not seeking work, did he HAVE A JOB, business, etc.? (Yes or No).
  
  For persons answering "No" to question 21, 22, 23 and 24.
• Indicate whether engaged in home housework (H), in school (S), unable to work (U), or other (Ot).
  
  If at private or nonemergency Govt. work. "Yes" in col. 21.
• Number of hours worked during week of March 24-30, 1940.
  If seeking work or assigned to public emergency work. ("Yes" in Col. 22 or 23).
• Duration of unemployment up to March 30, 1940 - in weeks.

Occupation, Industry and Class of Worker:

For a person at work, assigned to public emergency work, or with a job ("Yes" in Col. 21, 22, or 24), enterpresent occupation, industry, and class of worker. For a person seeking work ("Yes" in Col. 23): a) if he has previous work experience, enter last occupation, industry, and class of worker; or b) if he does not have previous work experience, enter "New worker" in Col. 28, and leave Cols. 29 and 30 blank.

• Occupation: Trade, profession, or particular kind of work, as frame spinner, salesman, laborer, rivet heater, music teacher.
• Industry: Industry or business, as cotton mill, retail grocery, farm, shipyard, public school.
• Class of Worker.
• Number of weeks worked in 1939 (Equivalent full-time weeks).

Income in 1939 (12 months ended December 31, 1939):

• Amount of money wages or salary received (including commissions).
• Did this person receive income of $50 or more from sources other than money wages or salary? (Yes or No).
• Number of Farm Schedule.

Supplementary Questions 35-50:

For persons enumerated on lines 14 and 29 [about a 5% sample of the population]

• Name.

For Persons of All Ages:

Place of Birth of Father and Mother
If born in the United States, give State, Territory, or possession. If foreign born, give country in which birthplace was situated on January 1, 1937. Distinguish: Canada-French from Canada-English and Irish Free State from Northern Ireland.

• Father.
• Mother.

Mother Tongue (or Native Language):

• Language spoken in home in earliest childhood.

Veterans:

Is this person a veteran of the United States military forces; or the wife, widow, or under-18-year-old child of a veteran?

• If so, enter "Yes."
• If child, is veteran-father dead? (Yes or No)
• War or military service.

Social Security:

• Does this person have a Federal Social Security Number? (Yes or No)
• Were deductions for Federal Old-Age Insurance or Railroad Retirement made from this person's wages or salary in 1939? (Yes or No)
• If so, were deductions made from (1) all, (2) one-half or more, (3) part, but less than half, of wages or salary?

Usual Occupation, Industry, and Class of Worker:

Enter that occupation which the person regards as his usual occupation and at which he is physically able to work. If the person is unable to determine this, enter that occupation at which he has worked longest during the past 10 years and at which he is physically able to work. Enter also usual industry and usual class of worker. For a person without previous work experience, enter "None" in column 45 and leave columns 46 and 47 blank.

• Usual occupation.
• Usual industry.
• Usual class of worker.

For all women who are or have been married:

• Has this woman been married more than once? (Yes or No)
• Age at first marriage.
• Number of children ever born (do not include stillbirths).

Symbols and Explanatory Notes

Column Number and Heading	Codes Used	Code Meaning
Column 10: Color or Race	W Neg In Chi Jp Fil Hin Kor	White Negro Indian Chinese Japanese Filipino Hindu Korean
Column 11: Age at Last Birthday	11/12 10/12 9/12 8/12 7/12 6/12 5/12 4/12 3/12 2/12 1/12	April 1939 May 1939 June 1939 July 1939 August 1939 September 1939 October 1939 November 1939 December 1939 January 1940 February 1940
Column 14: Highest Grade of School Completed	0 1 to 8 H-1 to H-4 C1 to C4 C-5	None Elementary School, 1st to 8th High School, 1st to 4th year College, 1st to 4th year College, 5th year or more
Column 16: Citizenship of the Foreign Born	Na Pa Al Am Cit	Naturalized Having First Papers Alien American Citizen Born Abroad
Columns 30 and 47: Class of Worker	PW GW E OA NP	Wage/Salary Worker in Private Work Wage/Salary Worker in Gov't Work Employer Working on Own Account Unpaid Family Worker
Column 41: War or Military Service	W S SW R Ot	World War Spanish-American War; Philippine Insurrection or Boxer Rebellion Spanish-American War & World War Regular Establishment or Peace-Time Service Other War or Expedition

Tomorrow I will explain how you can find your family in the 1940 census once you know the ED (Enumeration District) number where your family was living if you know where they were.

All Rights Reserved

except for NARA information

Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino

The iPad and Power Point Presentations

After purchasing an iPad2 the day after Christmas, I wanted to learn how to use it at its full potential.  I'm not there yet but certainly am getting there.

One day when speaking with our daughter Sarah I told her how
I  l-o-v-e my iPad but wished I could use it for Power Point Presentations.  She said I could as someone at work had done so about a week or two earlier.  The search began to find out just how this could be done.

At first I found SlideShark, a free app, that looked like it could do the job.  I gave it a try.  While it seemed to work well I did not like that in converting my presentation it changed some things - I won't go into that here since that really isn't the focus I want to share at this time.

The same afternoon, my friend Gerry Savard posted a message on Facebook that I should try the *Keynote* App.  I did a search and everything I read about it sounded good.  What I especially liked was the fact that I could also download the *Keynote Remote* to my iPod Touch and use it as a remote control during my presentations.  I learned all that I could about it online especially at apple.com. Everyone seemed quite happy with these two apps.

Having done my homework, I decided that before I purchased *Keynote* app for $9.99 and  *Keynote Remote* for 99 cents that I should go to the Apple store to confirm that this would work very well and satisfy my needs when setting up and when presenting a Power Point presentation.  So armed with what I had learned in those few hours, I packed up my iPad2 and my iPod Touch and headed to the Apple store.

When I arrived at the store I checked in, I explained why I was there and that I wanted someone to show me how this would all work with the iPad and iPod Touch. (This is what you do when going to the Apple store for help.)  I was put on the list and about ten minutes later someone was available to consult with me.

He told me how great  the *Keynote* app is but said *Keynote Remote* did not work with the iPad.  Ah ha!.. and this is why it pays to do your homework.  I told him I had done my homework and that the Apple site said it did work with the iPad.  He pulled up the Apple site and was so excited by this news that he immediately loaded the app to his iPhone.  After his excitement he showed me exactly how it all worked.  I then went to the App store with my iPad and purchased *Keynote* for my iPad and *Keynote Remote* for my iPod Touch.  He then watched me as I duplicated what I had seen him do on the store iPad, etc.  I didn't want to have any doubt about how this worked after leaving the store.   [*Keynote Remote* app works with the iPad, iPod Touch and iPhone].

In order to do Ppt presentations with the iPad on a projector, it is necessary to buy a VGA adapter at the Apple store ($39.99). Loading one of my presentations to *Keynote* was easy and the conversion kept my presentation intact and made no changes as it had on SlideShark.

After playing with all of this for a few weeks I still had not tried this with a computer projector and thought I should give this a try before doing a presentation in real time.  I contacted Gerry who is president of ACGS and asked him if it would be possible to try it with the society's projector.  He was happy to accommodate and a couple of other interested people/members came along.

What I immediately realized is that I should purchase a VGA extension cord like the one on the projector.  I had wondered where I would be able to place my iPad given that the VGA adapter is short.  This is a great solution. With the extension cord you can have the iPad in front of you in a safe place.

iPad connected to the projector and presentation up on the wall/screen next we wanted to see how well my iPod Touch would work as a remote.  It was *perfect*.  The presentation shows up on the iPod Touch (or iPhone) either one or two slides at a time depending on whether you choose portrait or landscape mode.  It works so well that I was able to go out in the hall and change slides - nice!  This meant there was plenty of range.  Too, the room we were in is a conference room and quite large.

We did this using WiFi.  Next Gerry put settings on both devices on Bluetooth.  As he said, everywhere I go will not have WiFi.  This is where we ran into a problem.  My devices would not connect and they should have.  We put everything away and Gerry did a search on the Internet and found that IOS5 had some kind of "bug" that caused the devices to not always connect with Bluetooth. In my case they would not connect at all.  He found an app called Bluetooth Photo Image that I downloaded (free app).  It worked well at ACGS but then would not work quite as well when I got home.  Dilemma and chagrin!

The new iPad had been unveiled earlier in the day so I decided to go take a look at that all while charging my iPod with my PC.  As soon as iTunes opened there was a message that the IOS5 was going to be upgraded to IOS5.1 - I did a search and the upgrade was to correct certain "bugs" in 5.  As soon as the iPod was upgraded I connected the iPad to upgrade the IOS.  I then tried connecting using Bluetooth and I am very happy to say they connect!  Tried it a few times last evening and again this morning and the connection works just fine.  Dilemma and chagrin all gone!

To do Power Point presentations with your iPad (all models) you need to do the following - click into the App store and purchase

1. Keynote App for your iPad

2. Get Keynote Remote for the iPhone or iPod Touch (won't work with earlier models of iPod).

2. Go to the Apple Store and purchase the VGA adapter.

I highly recommend you purchase your own VGA extension cord - under $10 for a Belkin on Amazon.

I'm enthralled with the idea that I can travel to do presentations without lugging around my laptop and its accessories.  Nice to travel light.

I've not spoken yet where there is no WiFi and I always ask when being booked for a talk.  When there is, I have duplicates of my presentation in DropBox and another on my PC at home.

Using SplashTop on my iPad (about $4.99) and SplashTop Streamer on my PC, I can access my home computer from anywhere.  I would never go out to speak without a back up plan for my presentations.

When  there is no WiFi connection available, I will work out a back-up plan when the time comes.

As Gerry mentioned in his comment below - something I forgot to say - is that another reason you would want your iPad close to you is that you can user  your finger as a laser pointer if you place it where you want to point on your presentation.  So when I want to point out a particular spot on a document, I just place my finger on that spot and it shows up as a pointer on the presentation.

That's the scoop - it was fun to try this out and now I am eager to do it in real time.  I recommend this to anyone doing presentations.  Be daring and give it a whirl - get the most out of that iPad, iPod Touch and/or iPhone.

My thanks to Gerry for all his help.  If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

I love technology and as everybody knows *I  L-O-V-E  MY iPAD*!!!!

Soon I will put together a workshop entitled "Technology, Genealogy and You". Stay tuned

MARCH 17, 2014 UPDATE:

1.  Apple updated its KEYNOTE app so that remote is built in so that it is no longer necessary to purchase Keynote Remote.  That said, I have no plan to purchase a newer iPod Touch that I presently use for my remote and the new Keynote cannot be loaded to it as it is not the latest iOS.  Nonetheless, the remote should continue working as it has always.  Because Apple is discontinuing its use does not mean it will not work if you already have it.

2.  I have no plan to ever own a Smartphone so I have purchased an iPad Mini with cellular.  That will solve the problem if ever I need to retrieve data and there is no WiFi where I am speaking.  You must tremember to turn off cellular when doing your presentation unless you need it during your talk.

3.  When purchasing an extension cord, I got a 10 foot but should have a 20 foot cord. You never know how far you will be from the projector.  That said though, when using a remote for your presentation, you can change slides from anywhere in the room so it depends on where you want to be during your talk.

4.  I did put together a workshop entitled  "Technology, Genealogy and You".  It is a beginner's workshop so anyone with a vast techie knowlede might not be interested.

All Rights Reserved

Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino

Cadie - That Feisty Loveable Little Bird

Cadie was a Parakeet (aka Budgie) and yes, she was a feisty little bird.

Born thirteen years ago, our daughter Rebecca bought her while attending Boston University.  She had her own apartment and this little bird was good company. Once in a while I would take Cadie home with me and we called it "Budgie Camp".  I fell in love with that beautiful little creature from the get-go.  Cadie was coming to "Budgie Camp" so often that our daughters and then recently married son-in-law decided to gift me with my own budgie for my birthday.  (That's another story for another blog.)

Cadie was an independent little girl.  If she didn't like something, she let you know it in her own little way. After Rebecca and Tyler were married they brought Cockatiels to live with them named Charlie,  Reggie and Tommy. Cadie seemed to get along find with them.  When they moved to the Philadelphia area while Rebecca attended Temple U., I drove my car to help them with the move and Cadie came in my car for the trip.  She was a very good traveler and always had been.  When we stopped for lunch, I opened my car door and Rebecca opened hers (she had the Charlie and Reggie in her car) and both Cadie and Charlie were "talking" to one another.  We got a kick out of that.

A few years later they all moved back to Massachusetts.  Charlie began laying eggs and before we knew it there were quite a few baby Tiels in their home. That many birds surrounding little Cadie was more than she could take so Rebecca called one evening and asked if I would take Cadie.  It was a no brainer.  Within minutes we were on our way to Peabody to pick up Cadie. She was familiar with Whisper (the Budgie given me for my birthday).  She was happy to be here and I was happy to have her. 

Many afternoons I would go in the bedroom with them, shut the door and allow them the freedom to fly, play, sit or whatever.  They would sit on my shoulders one on each side all the while chattering and cooing.

During the cold weather months I kept them in my home office as it was warmer with the computer running all the time. After I covered them for the night, Cadie would let me know she was unhappy if I came into the room  with a ch ch ch type of chatter like you are disturbing me.

In her earlier years she was very feisty. When we opened her cage she would squawk and tried to bite us but after a few moments, she would readily get up on a finger and enjoy being with us.  Budgies are such social birds and that is what makes them enjoyable pets.  In later Spring and throughout Summer she would chatter up a storm when I'd be rolling the cage to the living room.  She enjoyed watching television and being with us.  When in the other room with me, she would "whistle" when I had music playing.  As the years rolled by Cadie mellowed.

Yes, Cadie mellowed so much so that the past few weeks not only would she fly to my shoulder when I opened the door to her cage, but because at thirteen old age was setting in and she wasn't feeling her usual self, she would prefer to get on my lap and snuggle under my sweater to keep warm or fly to my shoulder and snuggle along my neck for the same reason.  I would hold her in the palm of my hand covering her with the other hand and she would sleep... she needed body warmth to help her along. By last week, every time I came into the room she would get near the door of the cage for me to pick her up.  I would take her into the living room with me holding her on my chest and covering her with a small blanket - there she would stay.. never budging.. just warm and comfortable she would sleep.

Cadie was losing weight - never a good thing for a bird.  She had always been a solid kind of bird when picked up.  Never overweight, just good and solid.  Last Friday, it was obvious she was losing weight.  She was no longer eating her pellets or millet (which birds love).  Rather all she seemed to be able to eat was bread that used to be her morning treat. She used to wait on her perch each morning for me to give her a small piece as her treat of the day.  Little did I know that someday it would be all she could eat to sustain her little body.

Saturday Cadie looked like she was making a come back. She felt heavier and she was spry:  ah yes, the tempest before the storm!  Sunday her weight was down again and having a difficult time to swallow she ate very little and was no longer drinking water.  Through it all, the only thing this little bird wanted was to be with me. She wanted to be held and kept warm.  At that stage I always imagine it must feel good for birds to be off their feet for a bit.  I've had other birds and at end stages it was always like this but Cadie was different in so many ways.  I believe that her feistiness was often her strength and when she loved you it was as strong as she was feisty.

When in Pennsylvania she was very sick.  The vet ordered special shots for her and she made a full recovery. She was a fighter!  Another thing about her is that she seemed to really like a clean cage and I cleaned her cage religiously every morning.  She loved to take longggg baths, her last one a week and a half ago.

I don't know where she found the strength but on Sunday, twice when I opened her cage, she flew to my shoulder - that is just how much she wanted to be with me in her last days.

Early yesterday morning, January 30th, our beloved Cadie passed. The wind picked up and I just knew Cadie was flying as fast as she could to be with our other birds - if there is a bird heaven they are all together now. When there is a thaw, I will bury  her under the Rose of Sharon with the other birds that passed on. She will be in good company with Budgies Whisper, Sweet Pea, Kiwi; Tweety Bird (a Canary) and Tommy (a Tiel). As you see Cadie is now in good company with our own familiy of birds.

Yesterday was a very sad day and I cried a lot but at the same time I was very happy that Cadie and I had such a strong bond that she could trust me to the very end.  Throughout the day I wondered how many little birds would climb onto someone, snuggle under a sweater to keep warm and allow themselves to held in the palms of one's hands to warm them up.  This was very consoling as it spoke to me of the trust Cadie had that I would provide and protect her the best I could.  Yes, she was a truly exceptional bird!

I now miss her chatter when I come to the computer to write or to work. This room has become so quiet and empty. Isn't it funny how such a little creature can fill a room?  Of course, with her personality, Cadie was bigger than life!  I miss that feisty and independent little bird who endeared herself to all our hearts. She was our girl and we loved her.

There will never be another little Cadence/Cadie.

All Rights Reserved

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino

Lucie's Legacy

2012 - Present

Bread & Roses Strike of 1912 - 100 Years Later - Lawrence, Massachusetts

The above photo was taken as protesters marched 

against owners of the mills in Lawrence, Massachusetts.

My mother sometimes talked about this strike. She was already working in the mills. Immigrant families left Canada in search of work and in hopes of a better life. Agriculture had dried out because our ancestors knew nothing back then about crop rotation but they'd heard there was lots of work in the mills of Fall River, Lawrence and Lowell, Massachusetts as well as Manchester, New Hampshire. Mills sprung up in many cities and towns. It became a way of life until the mills left in the 1950's and headed south where labor was cheaper than in these northern mills where workers had learned to unionize to protect their rights.

On January 12th, 1912 the labor protest that became known as the "Bread and Roses" strike began in Lawrence.

A new state law had reduced the maximum workweek from 56 to 54 hours. Factory owners responded by speeding up production and cutting workers' pay. Polish women were the first to shut down their looms and leave the mill. As they marched through the streets, workers from all the city's ethnic groups joined them. Over the next months, increasingly violent methods were used to suppress the protest, but the strikers maintained their solidarity. After Congress held hearings on the situation, the mill owners were anxious to avoid bad publicity. They settled with the strikers, bringing to an end a watershed event in American labor history.

The Bread and Roses Strike of 1912 changed U.S. labor laws forever.

Background

On January 12, 1912, workers in the American Woolen Company Mills in Lawrence, Massachusetts, opened their pay envelopes to find that their wages had been cut. They took to the streets in protest, beginning a history-making confrontation between labor and capital. The "Bread and Roses Strike," as it became known, broke new ground in several ways. More than half of the workers in the Lawrence textile mills were women and children, and women played a major role in the strike. Most of the workers were unskilled newcomers from the Middle East, southern and eastern Europe. They spoke more than a dozen different languages and practiced a variety of religions and ethnic customs. What bound them together was the need to improve their living and working conditions.

By the turn of the twentieth century, New England's factory towns were generally miserable places. Wages were low, rents were high, and living conditions were crowded and unhealthy. The factory floors were brutally hot in summer and painfully cold in winter. The machinery was dangerous; pressure to speed up production increased the risk of accident and injury.

The photo below is that of a "spinner" girl. Girls and boys worked as young as ten years of age in the mills. It was the same for bobbin girls or lap boys, bobbin girls kept the spinners supplied with bobbins as needed. I really don't know what my mother started as in the mills but I do know that as far back as I can remember she was a weaver in the weave room. I remember my brother being a bobbin boy when he started working in the mills. Later he worked in the "Mule Room". Actually, it was really the Spinning Room but it was called the "Mule Room" simply because the spinning machine was called a "spinning mule". My grandfather, aunts and uncles were all weavers. During World War II the Lawrence Mills wove material for army uniforms as well as blankets.

Under Massachusetts law, schooling was compulsory for children under age 14, but poverty forced many parents to lie about their sons' and daughters' ages and send them to work in the mills. One boy, asked if he'd like to go to school, said that he would love to, but he wanted to eat. My mother was eleven years old in January of 1912 and had left school in sixth grade to work in the mills.

In response to reports on the deplorable conditions at the mills, the Massachusetts legislature voted to reduce the maximum workweek from 56 to 54 hours. The law took effect on January 1, 1912. Although the legislation was intended to help the workers, many of them feared, correctly, that the mill owners would simply speed up production and cut their pay by two hours a week.

When workers opened their first paychecks in January and discovered that what they feared had in fact come to pass, a near-riot broke out. Polish women were the first to shut down their looms and leave the factory; they marched through the streets of Lawrence shouting "short pay!" They were soon joined by other workers drawn from the city's many different ethnic groups.

Because the country's most established labor organization, the American Federation of Labor, drew its membership from mostly white, English-speaking skilled craftsmen, it had no interest in a strike that involved women and unskilled, foreign-born workers. The AFL denounced the Lawrence protest as "revolutionary" and "anarchistic."

The owners were initially unconcerned. Without the assistance of the AFL, the Lawrence workers would never be able to sustain a strike. But the more radical Industrial Workers of the World, (I.W.W.) stepped in and sent organizers to Lawrence. Relief committees were formed to provide food, medical care, and clothing to strikers and their families. One magazine reported, "At first everyone predicted that it would be impossible to mold these divergent people together, but aside from the skilled men, comparatively few [broke the strike and] went back to the mills...."

The strikers employed some new tactics. Large groups went in and out of stores, not buying anything but effectively disrupting business. Huge marches were organized, with strikers singing songs, chanting, and carrying banners. One reporter wrote, "It was the spirit of the workers that was dangerous. They are always marching and singing."

One group of women carried a banner proclaiming, "We want bread and roses too." Roses signified the respect due to them as women, rather than just as cheap labor. The slogan caught on and provided the refrain for a popular new song—and the name of one of the most important events in American labor history. Once it was clear that the strikers had solidarity and leadership, management and city officials responded with force. The state militia broke up meetings and marches; soldiers sprayed protesters with fire hoses in frigid winter weather.

Bread and Roses by James Oppenheim

As we come marching in the beauty of the day, A million darkened kitchens, a thousand mill lofts gray, Are touched with all the radiance that a sudden sun discloses, For the people hear us singing "Bread and roses, bread and roses." As we come marching, marching, we battle too for men, For they are women's children and we mother them again, Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes; Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread but give us roses! As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead Go crying through our singing their ancient cry for bread. Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew. Yes it is bread we fight for but we fight for roses too! As we come marching, marching, we bring the greater days. The rising of the woman means the rising of the race. No more the drudge and idler - ten that toil where one reposes, But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses, bread and roses!

In February, children of strikers were sent to live with sympathetic families in other cities, a tactic that had been used successfully in Europe. The exodus of the children was a public relations disaster for the Lawrence authorities, and they forbade children to leave the city. On February 24th, a group of defiant mothers accompanied their children to the railroad station. Police surrounded and brutally clubbed women and children alike, then threw them into patrol wagons; 30 women were detained in jail.

Newspapers reported this ugly scene, and people all around the country were outraged. A congressional investigation began. As witnesses described working conditions in the mills and the events of the strike, President William Howard Taft ordered an investigation into industrial conditions in Lawrence and throughout the nation.

By March, the hearings had caused so much negative publicity that the American Woolen Company decided to settle. On March 12, 1912, management agreed to the strikers' demands for a 15% pay raise, double pay for overtime, and amnesty for strikers. The striking workers had demonstrated a powerful lesson: even traditionally powerless groups such as women and recent immigrants could prevail if they worked together.

Bread and Roses Mural

Here is what the Massachusetts AFL-CIO Labor Union said about it:
 

"One of the most prolific strikes in United States history was the Bread and Roses strike in Lawrence, Massachusetts in 1912. On the heals of a labor victory in legislation, reducing the work week from fifty-six to fifty-four hours, employers in Lawrence’s mills reacted by slashing wages to compensate for lost work. The mill owners expected their workers to be unhappy about the slash in pay, but did not expect the full scale retaliation that followed.

Lawrence at the turn of the century was a city of immigrants from many different backgrounds. These immigrants worked in Lawrence’s mills, and because of their different ethnic backgrounds, mill owners believe that the workers would not be able to organize because of ethnic differences. The owners proved to be wrong. In the first week of the strike, angry workers walked from mill to mill hurling bricks and stones through mill windows encouraging workers in those mills to walk off the job as well as a result of the pay cut. During the first week 14,000 workers walked off the job in Lawrence and were followed by 9,000 more in the coming weeks.

The Industrial Workers of the World, the IWW or “Wobblies,” took a major role in orchestrating and leading the strike. They successfully organized the different ethnic groups who lived and worked together and raised the money necessary to feed and provide for the strikers and their families. Many children were sent away to other cities in order to maintain the resources for the striking workers. This move gained tremendous sympathy from the public, and therefore the factory owners attempted to make sure this practice was stopped immediately. On February 24, 1912, they sent police officers to prevent some mothers and children from leaving Lawrence on a train to Philadelphia. The officers beat up the women and children and caused a public relations nightmare that led to a Congressional investigation of the strike. The owners realized that they had been beaten and finally came to terms with the IWW.

The true heroes of this strike were the women of the city of Lawrence. Women’s neighborhood associations were focused more the womanhood than ethnic identity, and thus became more inclusive and unifying which significantly helped the IWW to organize the striking workers and their families. Women also were prolific forces on the picket lines. They were better than the men at finding scabs who were attempting to cross picket lines, and were often more militant than their male counterparts."

Sources

Mass Moments

Commonwealth of Toil: Chapters in the History of Massachusetts Workers and Their Unions, by Tom Juravich, William F. Hartford, James R. Green (University of Massachusetts Press, 1996). Rebel Voices: An IWW Anthology, by Joyce Kornbluh (Charles H. Kerr Publishing, 1988). Bread and Roses: Mills, Migrants, and the Struggle for the American Dream by Bruce Watson (Viking, 2005).

Massachusetts AFL-CIO at http://www.massaflcio.org/1912-bread-and-roses-strike

Labor Notes http://labornotes.org/node/679

 

All rights reserved

Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino 
2012 - Present